This project will explore the roles of socioeconomic, psychological, behavioral, and other variables in explaining patterns in differential adult health and mortality among U.S. veterans. Differentials in mortality and in health represent a fundamental inequality in human well-being, and they are of interest both to policymakers and to researchers. Veterans are a more homogenous group than all civilians, yet there are clear health differentials among veterans grouped by rank. Examining differentials in health and mortality among veterans will thus inform our understanding of health disparities more generally, as well as our understanding of the well-being of veterans. The specific aims of the project are to examine health disparities by rank; to model health as a function of healthy behaviors, rank, socioeconomic status, and other health inputs, and to determine whether rank exerts an independent effect on health; to explore the pathways such as length of service and combat exposure through which rank exerts an effect on health; and to model smoking and health care utilization among veterans and to examine differences in behavior by rank. The project will examine data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) and the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study (WLS), two well-known panel surveys of individuals, as well as the 2003 Survey of Retired Military (SRM) and the 2001 National Survey of Veterans (NSV), two cross-sectional studies. Health disparities between groups indicate underlying differences in well-being. Such differences are particularly interesting in the case of veterans stratified by rank because veterans are a relatively homogeneous group that is differentially subject to psychosocial stress and other risk factors we wish to research. Investigating health disparities is a critical frontier in public health because we do not fully understand why some groups are more healthy than others, even though health is a critical dimension of well-being. [unreadable] [unreadable] [unreadable] [unreadable]